The Grand Tale of the Harvest Moon-Grand Bazaar
by Glacier Prince
Summary: Join me on a sort of altered replay of my walk through the Harvest Moon Game, Grand Bazaar. From nothing, a town is changed from a remote ghost town into the central buzz of the countryside. Times are now exceedingly plentiful, but it took the hard work of one of Zephyr Town's newest residents to do so. Rated T for some touchy subjects...
1. Chapter 1

"I must say, Andrew. We wouldn't have gotten the title of 'Best Bazaar in Town' without your help. I just gotta thank ya." Mayor Felix began, one gentleman's poker night. The card game had just started, as Stuart had just arrived to the farm not five minutes ago. I held up my hand in protest.

"Mayor, please. You shouldn't thank me for doing my job. If anything, you should thank Enrique, who sold me my chickens and cows, and thank ol' Isaac here for fixin' up the windmill for me." I glanced over at Isaac, who sat where he always sat, between Stuart and Raul. "Raul sells me seeds, and my buddy Lloyd here gave me permission to fish on his property. Joan taught me the recipies I know so far, and you yourself were the one who brought me to Zephyr Town."

They all looked around as I mentioned everyone's names. "So, if you were to thank anyone for my sucess, thank those who help me do my job. Don't thank me personally."

The Mayor let out a hearty laugh. Everyone else broke out into short bursts of laughter as well. Around me from my left to my right, in a circle, sat Raul, Isaac, Stuart, Mayor Felix, Wilbur, and Lloyd. We'd been trying, for many weeks now, to get Claude in on poker nights, but he said he was too busy.

I dealt the first three cards. Queen of hearts, nine of clubs, two of diamonds. I looked down at my hand. I had a queen of spades and a four of hearts. So far, it was looking good.

"I suppose you're right, Andy. A group effort for sure. Though, you serve a major part." Lloyd said.

"Let's just get on with poker night, eh boys?" Wilbur said. Solemn nods of agreement and a few _mhmmms_ from Stuart and Raul were all that was needed. Isaac's turn to start.

"I'm in." he said.

"I fold..." Stuart tossed his cards toward the center of the table, face down.

"Better believe it." Mayor Felix folded.

"Ugh, I'll stay another card." Wilbur said.

"I'm in." Lloyd said.

I looked at my cards one last time. "I'm in." I said.

"Fold." Raul said, and he tossed his cards aside.

I discarded, or burned, the next card, and placed the following card down. A six of spades. Wilbur's turn.

I saw him stare at his cards, and scratch his head. He let out a long sigh. "No chance of gettin a flush now. I fold." He tossed his cards aside.

"I'm staying." Lloyd said.

"Same." I said.

Isaac also stayed, though he only tapped on the table. Last card, it was Lloyd, Isaac and myself now competeing for a pot of 80G.

I burned the next card, and played the last card. A six of hearts. I had two pair now. I called.

I had a pair of queens, and a pair of sixes.

Lloyd had a pair of nines and a pair of sixes.

Isaac chuckled to himself as he revealed the other two sixes in his hand.

I started laughing, and reached across the table to give the man a high five. He had the best poker face I knew.

After a few more hands, Daisy knocked on the door. She was returning home from work, which meant it was around 9pm. I was getting cleaned out tonight. Out of the 100G each of us brought, I was down to a mere 45G. Raul was currently winning, at 175G, Isaac in second with 135G, and Wilbur in third with 105G. Lloyd and Major Felix were tied at 75G a piece, and Stuart had 65G.

"Come on in Daisy." I yelled at the door. She entered, removed her bonette, set down her duster, and came behind me and put her arms around my neck. She kissed my cheek. "How was work?"

She sighed. "Tiring. I'm just glad to come home to see all the boys having fun after the Bazaar."

She greeted everyone around the table from her position behind me, and they all tipped their hats in a kind 'hello.' She asked if anyone needed anything before she retired to the bedroom. A bottle of Strawberry Fizz was fetched, along with seven fizz glasses. She curtsied before heading down the hallway.

"Goodnight, boys. By the way, Andy has two aces. If you haven't already, fold." I turned and looked at her, and she was simply beaming. She left just then.

I turned back to the table. Raul and Lloyd had already folded. Everyone else, in unison it seemed, uttered the dreadful word.

"Fold..." The first three cards hadn't even been placed yet. Wich meant the pot was only 5G a piece for 45G. I put my head in my hand. I showed them that I indeed did have two aces. I exhaled deeply, trumming my fingers along the table's edge.

I could hear Daisy laughing from the bedroom.

It was 11pm before Lloyd finally lost all his money. I sat in a happy 5th place, with tonight's big winner being Isaac, followed by Wilbur, Raul, Felix, myself, then Stuart.

Two bottles of Strawberry Fizz had been drank, and a third had been started. When all the money was pocketed, and I gave the remaining bottle of Fizz to Isaac, everyone departed, and I went off down the hallway towards the bedroom.

Would tonight be the night that we slept together, for the first time? I felt nervous. My stomach began to rumble. I decided against it. Daisy understood. I got extremely nervous at thoughts of sharing my bed with another. I was about to place my hand on the door, when I did an about-face, and instead fell asleep on the couch. Tomorrow, tomorrow night I'd do it.


	2. Chapter 2

"He was well loved, and he didn't even know it." Mayor Felix said, bowing his hat as Wilbur, Isaac, and I, lowered the coffin into it's grave. The whole town had shown up. The date was Winter 4, and the whole town, even Raul's brothers, now sat in small chairs on the edge of the town, past the race track, mourning one of Zephyr Town's joyful youths.

It was Angelo. For someone so bright, so talented with his artwork, to think himself unloved, and then commit suicide. Freya was still crying. I hope she thinks that this wasn't her fault. Winter Harmony day was just a few weeks away. Freya was madly in love with Angelo, yet, she never told him. She had no time to. She worked from 8am to 9pm in the city, and didn't get home until Angelo was already home, asleep.

Everyone wore their darkest clothing. Antionette sewed for Isaac, Wilbur and myself matching uniforms, as we were the ones who volunteered to carry the cask.

When the casket was lowered to the bottom, I looked around. The twins hadn't stopped crying, though they were both silent. Nellie was trying her best to comfort her twin daughters, though her eyes weren't any better, and she had a tissue in her left hand. Claire looked about the same, though Kevin was trying to keep a straight face, but to no avail. He held tight a flower, and when I stepped out of the way, he tossed it into the hole. Cindy and Lauren did the same.

Marian and Joan were doing better than the aforementioned. Both had hankerchiefs held to their tears, it's true, but not the waterworks that it seemed everyone else had.

Sherry, Antionette, Daisy, and Dirk stood behind Mayor Felix, all thinking deeply to themselves. Freya was crying on Sherry's shoulder, who comforted her friend.

Raul, Diego, and Enrique wore normal black suits, for a change. Each had on a tie unique to his favorite color, Raul, red, Diego, purple, Enrique, blue. Their heads were down at the moment, although while moving the casket, they sung the town's funeral tune.

Stuart and Ethel were the only ones sitting, Ethel having suffered a heart attack a few weeks prior, and she had just recovered. Obviously, they were thinking about what might happen to them. Joan as well, as she was just about the same age as they were.

"I'd like those of you who can to say a few words, regarding Angelo." Mayor Felix said, a deep tone of grief in his voice.

Of everyone to step forward, it was Dirk, whom had a very rough history with Angelo, who came forward.

"Angelo...He. He was, and I wish he still was, an amazing person. He wasn't the boy who was all about playing, he wasn't the one that liked bugs, or tried to catch toads and put them in the girl's hair. Yet, as he grew older, and we all knew this, he became Angelo the Artist for a reason. On bazaar days, he went around the bazaar, looking for the right painting. He'd set up, and if you've ever been in his cellar, you'd know how good of an artist he was.

"He and I had a rough past, over these last few years, but if his ghost can hear me, I'd like him to know that I will sorely miss him." He said this last part with a smile. He stepped back.

One by one, person after person came forward with a good memory they had with Angelo, or describing what a kind young man he was. Even I admitted, that when the Mayor first called me to Zephyr, Angelo was there to show me the ropes of the town. Where the best spots to relax were, how the sunset would kiss the mountain in just the right way on certain days of the week.

And then it was Mayor Felix and Freya left.

"I wanted to share the final thoughts of the departed. If anyone is not comfortable with this, I won't do it." Mayor Felix said. No one objected. He sniffled, rubbed his eye, pushed his glasses back up his nose, and reached back to get out a folded sheet of paper, stained with paint globs. The Mayor cleared his throat. He read the following.

 _Friends,_

 _Today's bazaar will be the last I'll have. It was so good to see so many smiling faces before I did what I'm about to do. Seeing them almost made me change my mind, but I am not the same little boy Zephyr Town knew me as._

 _Something has changed, and it's dragging me down. I feel like everyone has been abandoning me lately, yet I know that infact the opposite is true. I just can't seem to get a foothold on the right track, and if this is all I'm meant to be, alone with my art, then I don't think anyone will miss me. Even now, my hands are shaky, but I want to write this final letter to whoever finds me. It won't be long now._

 _To everyone who I'm letting down, I apologize._

 _I love you all..._

 _...but I can't go on living any longer._

 _Angelo the Artist_

The Mayor was swimming in his own tears as he held the paper. It had paint on it yes, but I also knew for a fact that at the bottom of the paper, was Angelo's dried blood. The Mayor and Freya discovered his body, locked in his basement, about a week ago. I took a look after his body was moved out, and carted to the city for autopsy. All his bazaar pictures, torn canvas, every single one of them. Yet, no foul play was involved. Angelo slashed his memories before slicing his arteries. That was perhaps the final nail in the coffin for him. Without his art, he thought himself nothing.

The Mayor was probably bringing back some rather unpleasant memories.

The Mayor nodded at me. I had a shovel, next to the pile of dirt we dug up.

"Freya will speak now, while Andrew buries the coffin." He gave the spot he was standing in to the young lady, who was puffy eyed, but now looked as calm as she could get.

I put the shovel in the dirt, and began, while Freya went on with her piece, unfolding a pink few sheets of paper. It was her Winter Harmony day note.

"First of all, I think it was obvious to everyone besides Angelo how much I had a crush on him. And so, with Winter Harmony day only a few weeks away, I wrote him a love letter. I even asked Andrew to grow me some tea and apples. I was going to take him on a winter's day picnic, and tell him there." She looked at the coffin, as it got deeper and deeper into the ground.

"I was going to give him this note, and a chocolate kiss, along with a real one, if he'd let me. But I guess that day will never come now. So, on this day, I'd like to read it to Angelo, infront of everyone." She looked down, and began to read.

"Angelo, I'll tell you now. I like you. No, more than that, I think I love you. I'm in love with you. Your smile, your long, hazel curls, your eyes. You have an eye for everything simple in this world, yet amazing. Yet, you're amazing, yourself. To me, you are the masterpiece of my life, and I would want to wake up next to you and come home to a house filled with your art, only to fall asleep next to you. That's all I would want.

"You make me feel like butterflies are flittering about through my body, from my toes to my nose. I get nervous around you, unlike anybody else in the town, or at work. During festivals, I enjoy beind near you, even though it seems we hardly ever talk. But I listen. I listen to you.

"And now I'm wondering if you'll listen to me. I want to share this Winter Harmony day with one person. With you." She folded the paper up, and stuffed it in her black bag.

"Yet, if only I had told him sooner, perhaps you might still be here to answer, instead of the way it is now. Perhaps, today could've been like any other day for me. Perhaps Joan could be making the both of us tea, and perhaps Kevin would plant a bug in my purse, and you'd laugh because it's Kevin. But we'll never know." She began crying again. "It's all my fault. I let you down. I could've helped you, Angelo. But I didn't..."

She stopped. A tiny body was embracing her waist. It was Kevin.

"Freya...don't blame yourself. Please..." Kevin said through gasps of crying fits. I dropped my shovel on the dirt pile, and walked over to see to the both of them. Freya fell to her knees, and Kevin hugged her while she sat on the ground, weeping.

One by one, everyone came and placed their hand on Freya. The town had her interests at heart, and we were all there for her incase she needed it.

The Raul brothers began humming the town's funeral tune while everyone left. I stayed to finish, along with Freya and Kevin. When all the dirt had been replaced, Freya left her note next to the headstone, and Kevin took his hat off, and placed it next to the note.

That night, as Daisy passed the fields to go to bed, to which I was plowing for a new crop Raul sold me earlier that week, I felt arms around my abdomen. It was Daisy.

"P-please, Andy...I don't want to sleep alone tonight..."

I stood up straight, and turned around in her arms. She was much shorter than I was. I kissed her bonnette, held her face in my hands, wiping a tear away with my dirty thumb off her cheek.

I was still nervous about sleeping together. I didn't know what it was. But she needed me tonight. "Alright." I said, looking into her eyes. "I'll be in after ten."

She hugged me, and half wandered, half speeded towards the house. Cloudy was pecking at some grass not far from the fields, and I saw my triple blue ribbon chicken turn her head and stare at me, confused. I shrugged at her.

I didn't want to go to bed filthy, not if I was going to be sharing it with Daisy tonight. So, I took a shower. I changed into actual pijamas, and made my way down the hallway to see that Daisy's door was open. The room was just as I remembered it, before Daisy moved in. Photos of myself and Cloudy as a baby chick, and Toffee, as a calf. Back when all I did was plant crops and then play with them.

A photo of Daisy and I's first date, a week after my second Spring Harmony day. She was so adorable back then. Now, six years later, she's turned into a beautiful young woman. She grew into herself.

My hands jittered as I approached the bedside. What was going to happen? Would anything happen? That's when she spoke.

"Andy." I began to sweat. I didn't know why. "Come lay with me, please."

"I-I-It's not that simple Daisy..." I said.

She sat up. "Sweety, come here." She patted the bedside next to her. I sat down. She reached out and gave me a kiss. "I understand that you were raised in a town where men and women slept in seperate beds. But we've been together six years now, engaged for a season now. Would it be that hard to just lay here until I fell asleep?"

I closed my eyes, and took a deep breath. I had been raised from birth, that unless you planned on having children that night, you never violated the sanctity of a woman's bed. And when she moved in, she didn't know that, and the constant pressure I guess somehow wound itself up to what it's been this last year. I heard shuffling, and opened my eyes. Daisy moved under the covers, her front side facing me, her blonde curls hanging on the pillows. She lifted the covers, inviting me in.

I laid down, still nervous. There was a voice nagging me in the back of my head. But then, she put her hands and head on my chest, and everything just melted away. I couldn't breathe for a few seconds, but when I exhaled, it was like everything went out with it.

I felt tired, although if it was from work, the funeral, or what was happening now, I didn't know. I closed my eyes.

Before I knew it, Daisy was stirring, and I woke up. The sun was shining through the window. My watch read 5:14am. I looked around the room without moving my head too much, and I saw Daisy changing for work. She was down to her panties, having just taken off her nightgown. She was changing her bra.

"Good morning." She said, her back still facing me. She turned her head, a small smile on her lips. "And thank you."


	3. Chapter 3

Bazaar day. Lots of stuff I want to sell. And here I stand, waiting for 10am to strike. I'd worked exceptionally hard this last seven days to exceed the goal of 100000G for the bazaar limit. Daisy had even helped some as well. She'd be in the hotel, watching after some of the children while attempting to do her daily cleaning.

Herb cheese, check. Milk, check. Wool, check. Lumber, check. Yoghurt, check. Strawberry Fizz, check. All four variations of salad, check. I went down my list. So, why did I feel like I was forgetting something. Cheese, milk, wool, lumber, yoghurt, fizz, fish, bread, butter, eggs...

I forgot the eggs in the cellar. Crap! I had like, seven dozen eggs down there. No way was I letting them go. I'd just have to open shop a little late. I dashed back home.

A cart. A cart. Where was my blasted cart? It was the quickest way to load and run the eggs through town. It was 9:30am. Bazaar opened in half an hour, and I still had estimates to do and prices to check.

"Daisy!" I yelled, looking through the barn high and low for the stupid cart I needed.

"What?" I heard her yell from the base of the hill. She was heading to work.

"Where's my spare cart?" I shouted.

"You're what?"

"My spare cart! Do you have any idea what I did with it?"

Her voice was getting closer. "Last I knew you gave a cart to Chen about a week ago."

That's right. I gave it to Chen so he could haul some lumber to his city home. I didn't have time to ride Winston, tie the cart to him, ride back, pick up the eggs, and set up shop in...

I looked at my watch. 9:37am.

...thirteen minutes.

Daisy's voice was right behind me now. "Why do you need another cart? You didn't have enough this morning?"

"No. I forgot all the eggs in the cellar this morning before I left. Came back to pick them up."

She huffed. "I asked you this morning if you had everything."

"I thought I did! I only noticed they were absent when doing inventory." I sighed. Her arms were crossed, and she had the, 'Honestly?' eyebrow raised. If I didn't have time to get a cart, I'd have to improvise. "Daisy?"

"What, darling?"

I might be sorry for asking this. "Would you help me run the eggs over?"

She smirked, and I was waiting for her to say no since I forgot and needed to make it up myself. She uncrossed her arms, reached and put her hands just above my rump, and put her head infront of my nose.

"Of course, darling. You only had to ask."

I carried five dozen, and Daisy carried the other two. They were in trays of two dozen each, but since it was such a hassel walking with them, and because it was usually quicker, I would've used a cart. But this was fine.

Daisy looked happy to help, and I for one was happy to have her helping. We got there only five minutes before the bazaar opened, and I sat down one last time after wishing Daisy good luck at work, taking out my pen to redo inventory.

Eggs, check...


End file.
